Safer Together work continues to flourish

STORY BY FIONA MACKEN

Despite all the challenges that the past 18 months have thrown at the Safer Together’s Community Based Bushfire Management (CBBM) project, the statewide project team continues to work feverishly with 22 diverse communities around Victoria, driven by the desire to see community values and priorities put front and centre in preparedness work undertaken by CFA and DELWP. CBBM is a community development project which aims to promote relationships between agencies, community members and local government and get everyone working well together to determine how locals and agencies can reduce bushfire risk. Twenty one of the 22 communities in the project are place-based communities in virtually all regions of Victoria. This year, the project’s first non-place-based community launched, with the addition of commercial equine studs in CFA’s North East Region. The past two years of CBBM and the Safer Together program more generally have produced many examples of tangible bushfire risk reduction activities, both through community engagement projects and collaborative multi-agency fuel management work by CFA, DELWP, local government, Parks Victoria and others. Communities have benefited greatly from the opportunity to work with land and fire management personnel to discuss how they would like to see action taken in their locality around planning and preparedness. The preparedness and resilience benefits built as a result of CBBM are not limited to fires, as many local residents believe that CBBM helped them during COVID-19 lockdowns and recent flooding. Although CBBM is funded to reduce bushfire risk, the fundamental core of the projects – relationships – builds community resilience whatever the emergency. CBBM also has significant benefits in other areas of emergency management such as response and recovery. Research has found that communities previously impacted by fire will have improved community responses when faced with another fire if they worked with a place-based facilitator, such as that offered by CBBM. CBBM and the wider Safer Together program are attempting to change how we all view fire safety and our individual responsibility. Basing agency decisions on the values and priorities of community or, perhaps going as far as to give decision-making power to community (for example, in relation to planned burning) is a mindset shift for CFA, DELWP and other stakeholders. Changes in longstanding models of power will bring challenges, as CBBM does, but the engagement the community has in the process is exceptional and strikes at the heart of the community’s desire to be involved in determining the outcomes of decisions that affect them, rather than being informed of the outcomes after the fact. CBBM has received a further four years funding from the Victorian Government. This is a fantastic outcome for the communities currently involved in the project because it means the work already undertaken can continue and be extended in ways that suit the local community. The CBBM team would like to thank all community and CFA members who have invested their time in this project – your commitment to this project is truly appreciated.

Making CBBM work well

Several evaluations of CBBM have been carried out since it began in 2016. The most recent one in 2021 focused on lessons learned since 2019. Valuable lessons for CBBM projects included: • Community development approaches need an investment of time over a number of years, supported by appropriate skills, experience, resources and commitment from relevant stakeholders • Building and maintaining strong, authentic relationships is not only an important aspect of the CBBM approach, but also an outcome of CBBM work with agencies and communities • Flexible, adaptive and place-based approaches are essential to the success of CBBM • It’s important to value community members’ diverse contributions and investment of time • Community and agency involvement are both essential for CBBM, reflecting the community-centred and multiagency partnership approach of CBBM • The role of the CBBM facilitator and their approach is critical for the success of CBBM • A range of external factors influence the practice of CBBM within communities—including time and financial resources available, and a community’s experiences of bushfire.

FIRST-HAND ACCOUNTS FROM CFA VOLUNTEERS

To demonstrate the benefits of the CBBM project, four videos have been created that feature community members (including three CFA volunteers) from Mallacoota, Peterborough, Tolmie and the Cann Valley area (Tamboon). They discuss the time they’ve invested in working with other stakeholders, such as CFA, DELWP and local government and why they found the process so worthwhile. They also discuss the benefits they’ve achieved as a result of taking a community development, long-term approach to reducing bushfire risk and doing it in a way that suits their local area and the needs of their local community. Locals, including CFA members, know their community best and projects such as CBBM want to work with that local knowledge to reduce risk and build resilience in the most suitable ways possible. To watch the videos, go to safertogether.vic.gov.au/ community-engagement.

Lyn Harwood, Mallacoota

Lyn Harwood is a CFA volunteer with Mallacoota Fire Brigade and is featured in a video called Building resilience through recovery. For several years, she has been instrumental in driving a fuel management project in Mallacoota, working with Gail Cumming, the CBBM facilitator with CFA in South East Region, and Michelle Kearns, the previous (DELWP) CBBM facilitator. Lyn described leading a multistakeholder process. “I put out a call generally to the Mallacoota community, inviting anyone who’s interested in talking about fuel management to come along to a meeting,” Lyn said. “I got half a dozen people and we continued to work with the agency people to try to come to a greater understanding, a shared understanding, about fuel management around Mallacoota. We came up with a number of plans for edge areas on the town.” Despite the 2019-20 fires, this work is continuing and provides a positive, practical focus for the community.

Frank Herbert, Tamboon

Frank Herbert is a CFA volunteer with Cann Valley Fire Brigade and lives in Tamboon. In the video Community preparedness: putting it into practice, Frank discussed how CBBM supported the community following the 2019-20 fire. “To live in a remote place like this and away from where you can get help, you really have to be able to do a lot of things yourself,” Frank said. “After the 2019-20 fire season we got together as a community and had a meeting in May and we formed an association,” Frank said. “The Safer Together team has really been very supportive to get things going. Our specific purpose that we identified was to protect life, property and the environment. I’ve been busy since this association was formed.

“As a community we’ve come together more so than ever before. Since the fires, the project has brought us even closer together.” In October 2021, the Cann Valley community plans to hold a ‘Cann Be Ready Day’. Frank and other local CFA volunteers will join forces with the SES to put on a demonstration of rescuing someone from a car wreck. CFA will also have preparedness material and experienced volunteers on hand to chat to locals about their household plans.

Cathy Marsh, Peterborough

Cathy Marsh, a volunteer with Peterborough Fire Brigade, used CBBM as an opportunity to focus on the preparedness of vulnerable people in the local community and develop ways to support them. Cathy worked with Sharon Mifsud, the CFA CBBM facilitator in South West Region and is featured in the video Supporting locals to address local needs. “The Safer Together team was incredibly supportive and through relationship building, strategies have been put in place in the local community to ensure that older residents are safe on days of high risk, particularly those who don’t access information or warnings using the VicEmergency app,” Cathy said.